It will take 20,000 bricks and cost him £100k to complete - but farmer James Foskett is determined to protect his ancient farmhouse from the next flood.

About 60 acres of the vegetable grower's land at Bromeswell, near Woodbridge, disappeared beneath the rising waters when Storm Babet struck on October 20, 2024.

Worst of all, his home was completely flooded in waters up to 3ft deep. He has lived by the River Deben all his life and had never seen anything like it.

"Our family has been here 75 years and we have never been flooded," he said.

Carpets and furniture were destroyed as water came up through the floor.

"It's cost us an arm and a leg to put right - I was a £60k claim."

He is now in the process of building a wall around the farmhouse garden with floodgates installed to prevent rising waters threatening the property.  In all it will cost about £100k, but he feels it will be worth it.

"I can't control what the Environment Agency should do so we are trying to look after ourselves," he said.

"We had nearly three feet of water in the left hand part of the house," he added. "It came up through the floors."

It ended up taking about six months to dry the house out. "It's horrible," he said. "Carpets were flooded and settees and furniture. We salvaged what we could."

He is now one of the founding members of the Lower Deben Riparian Owners' Group (LDOG) which met on Wednesday (October 23) to set up its inaugural committee.

James Foskett, right, with other founding members of the Lower Deben Riparian Owners' Group (Image: Lucy Taylor) He and others on the group believe that the flood threat which Storm Babet exposed is not going away and wants action taken to protect properties such as his.

(Image: Lucy Taylor)